Saint Thomas Aquainas was perhaps one of the greatest thinkers who attempted to bridge the proverbial gap between faith and reason. His Sacred Doctrine, which constituted the initial part of his Summa Theologica, was the basis of his conclusion about the existence of God. Aquinas tended to align his beliefs with Aristotle's assumption that there must be an eternal, imperishable creator. In comparison, Anselm's impressions were largely influenced by Plato. In his text Proslogion he set out his ontological argument regarding the existence of God. It was simply that God was the ultimate and most perfect being imaginable, and that His state of existence is greater than not existing, therefore God, being perfect in every way, must exist. This is where their paths diverge, and although they arrive at essentially the same determination, they paint a very different picture. Examining the two works in relation to each other as if it were a debate makes the comparison a little clearer. Aquinas reveals his argument that there are essentially two methods for understanding the truth. One being that it can be assumed by reason and logic, and the other by inner faith. On the surface, at this point, one could argue that this ontological determination is a little less convoluted than Anselm's, but I tend to think it might be a little more confusing. This is what leads him to affirm that the existence of God can be proven by reason alone or “a priori”. It was from this conviction that he formulated his Five Proofs or what he called the “Quinquae Viae”. The first is quite simple and relies on the fact that something moving must have been moved. Assuming that something set it in motion, there must have been a... middle of paper ... and since from what we know we can imagine things, the fact that we can imagine a infinite, transcendent world, omnipresent, omniscient and omnipotent God is proof that He exists, since what I can think of is real and can be known. (ch. 2) Aquinas's response would be that this is simply not the case, not everything can be known to mortal man and not everything that is real is directly obvious to us as humanity. It is no coincidence that Thomas Aquinas is thus widely considered one of the most brilliant Christian theologians. I agree that it makes much more sense that God cannot be imagined or thought of. Therein lies the mystery of God, and who He is transcends the mind and intellect He created. Only with a combination of this logic rooted in faith can we truly know that God exists through the effects of His omniscience and all that He has created..